“The war in Gaza is a flashpoint in regional tensions and has been for decades” | Photo credit: AFP
The July assassination of Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas' political bureau chief and the group's negotiator, in downtown Tehran has brought Israel and Iran to the brink of all-out war, and the region is bracing for an even more violent Iranian response than the April exchange of force between the two countries. Yet amid these rising tensions, Iran's closest partners, Russia and China, have maintained a curious degree of distance and vagueness.
The war in Gaza has been a regional flashpoint for decades, but in 2024 it is also embedded in a larger great power competition between the United States and its Western partners, on the one hand, and a China-led group (broadly including Russia, Iran, and North Korea) on the other. Iran has played a central role in this structure, providing Moscow with military-technical capabilities in the form of drones on the front lines of its war against Ukraine, and providing Beijing with cheap oil to replenish its strategic reserves.
“Influential Architecture”
However, both Russia and China have their own individual objectives that often differ from each other. Tehran’s stalemate in a region-wide conventional conflict means that it also needs to strengthen its capabilities. This demand may reach both Moscow and Beijing. While both countries have a common objective of weakening and even eliminating US control over West Asian security, they are also individually building their own influence structures that operate at an individual rather than collective level.
China has been diplomatically active, from its role as a middleman in the normalization of relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran in March 2023 to its recent embrace of Palestinian faction groups, including Hamas and Fatah, which have been at odds with each other since 2006. Beijing has remained unwavering and consistent in its support of the Palestinian cause, viewing it from two strategic perspectives: first, its refusal to accept the injustices perpetuated by Western colonization, and second, its general support for the Arab position. For example, one Chinese media outlet highlighted Haniyeh as a “pacifist.”
For Russia, the scenario is quite different. Moscow has been militarily embroiled in the Syrian conflict since 2015, when the Arab state's embattled leader, Bashar al-Assad, requested military assistance to repel the threat of the so-called Islamic State. Since then, Moscow has maintained a permanent base around Latakia province, which also provides it with crucial access to the Mediterranean Sea. Along with Russia, Iran also intervened to protect the Assad regime, and in return, strengthened its network of proxies in the country to defend its own strategic objectives.
Iran's nuclear development issue
Despite the above convergences, one area remains where both China and Russia continue to align with the West: the possibility of a nuclear-armed Iran. This concern is greater today than ever before as Iran is seen as on the brink of possessing nuclear weapons, i.e., very close to acquiring nuclear weapons capability. The recent election victory of the now moderate President Masood Pezeshkian and his selection of a reformist coalition that includes familiar names such as Abbas Araghchi as foreign minister may have raised hopes that nuclear negotiations might be resumed among the P5+1 leaders. This depends on multiple factors, including the outcome of the US presidential election in November, but access to familiar faces is seen as a rare positive in an otherwise overall dire scenario. In his analysis before the Iranian elections, Yoon Sun, a researcher at the Washington-based Stimson Center, said that China would like an Iranian leader who maintains an anti-Western and anti-American stance, but would not want one who would prioritize crossing the so-called red line to acquire nuclear weapons.
Local Realities
By most accounts, Russia is already more engaged and active in tactically undermining the power of the West than Beijing, which remains risk-averse. Strategically, Moscow has managed to compromise with the Global South on Ukraine and maintain a viable position, but its intelligence and military agencies are mobilizing in regions such as West Africa, challenging the long-standing U.S. and European presence. In West Asia, recent reports suggest that Russian intelligence is present in Yemen to support the Houthis disrupting international trade passing through the Red Sea, where even India has had to deploy a large navy to protect its ships. This is the reality of the region that has led the U.S. to insist on maintaining a small ground presence in Syria and Iraq. A withdrawal now would mean abandoning one of the last U.S. power projection bases in the region.
For the abovementioned disruptions to continue to benefit China and Russia, it is important that Iran does not get drawn into a traditional war with Israel. But it may be difficult for Tehran not to react to Haniyeh's killing, not only because it would make it look weak, but also because proxies that have long fought for Iran, such as Lebanon's Hezbollah, will press the Iranian leadership for a strong response.
Kabir Taneja is a fellow in the Observer Research Foundation's Strategic Studies Programme.
